Pages

Friday, November 13, 2015

Parenting Pointers: Parental Relationships, Sibling Rivalry, and Fear of Asking for Help

Pamela D. Wilson CSA, MS, BS/BA, CG

The familiar saying “you can choose your friends but not your family”
becomes a glaring reality when adult parents might benefit
significantly from a little assistance. The situation may not only be
that adult children are concerned about the demands of caring for
parents but that adult siblings simply may not get along and refuse to
work together in providing assistance for parents.

How do families arrive at a
point where parents and adult children prefer to avoid each other and
simply say “I’m done?” Relationship challenges may date back to
childhood dynamics that grew increasingly more difficult over time. One
child may have been favored by parents and the other children in the
family were jealous. One child may have competed for the attention of
parents by achieving good grades or excelling at sports while another
child failed to possess these talents — and struggled to make good
grades or was ridiculed by brothers, sisters, and other children for not
being physically strong, fast, or coordinated.

Some families simply become ambivalent as adult children move away
from parents and contact becomes less frequent. While many families
remain in contact, other family members question the value of making an
effort to gather when there is not an emotional connection to make the
excursion enjoyable — the annual family gathering is dreaded and
eventually avoided.

After years of avoidance, it becomes difficult for adult children to reverse the prior path, to forgive, and to show up at a family event
without being asked a thousand questions of where the child has been
and why he or she has avoided family all these years. Rather than face
this line of questioning, it is much easier to just stay away.

Add the complication of
marriage and situations where a parent may not like a son- or
daughter-in-law. This factor complicates many adult child-parent
relationships. There are situations where the son or daughter will visit
without their spouse because the interaction is too stressful.

Just the opposite are parental
situations where adult children could be more helpful but may have
criticized or become impatient with a parent when attempting to provide assistance.
This negative experience results in the parent hesitating to ask again
for assistance for fear of another negative interaction. The reality is
that most, if not all parents, would benefit from simple support long
before more advanced care is needed.

I know this because my parents
would have benefited from greater assistance earlier in life. They did
not ask. I made the assumption they were able to manage and later
discovered, after my mother’s death, all of the tasks for which I could
have provided assistance that would have made the daily lives of my
parents so much easier. A recent visit with very dear older friends
brought back memories of my parents and 20:20 vision of my experience
with my parents.

This couple, while still very able, is beginning to slow down.
They have an interest in the computer; a few minutes adding bookmarks
to a search engine and providing instructions for how to use Facebook
seemed like magic to them when this was a simple task for me.
Identifying a local elder law attorney to update documents took a few
minutes on the computer. The lives of my friends could be greatly
simplified, yet they hesitate to ask their children for assistance.

After visiting my friends, my
internal angel wanted to pick up the phone and speak to their children
about how they might help; the logical side of me agreed that a less
direct and different tactic might be better. Since I was added as a
“friend” to my friend’s Facebook page, I sent friend requests to their
children who I have been in touch with over the years in the hopes that
they might contact me and ask about my visit with their parents.

This gap of not wanting to be
seen as needing help represents the conundrum many of us face in life.
We fear asking for help or we feel like we are a burden to others if we
would ask for assistance. Perception also enters into the equation; the
perception of being able to manage daily life versus being seen as less
able, less intelligent or as old and frail by adult children and others.

This marginalization of older adults
is prevalent in our youthful society who continues to make all efforts
to distance from older adults who might be seen as wrinkled, unhealthy,
physically unable, or mentally slow. Heaven forbid we age, which we will
all do whether we like the experience or not.

When will we slow down, take a
deep breath and realize that a simple act of kindness — whether for a
parent, a brother, a sister, a friend or an unknown acquaintance — can
make all the difference in the world to a person who may be struggling?

We have assembled more detailed information about Caregiving and Caregiving From a Distance Family and Professional Caregivers on The Care Navigator.com.

Pamela
D. Wilson, MS, BS/BA, CG, CSA, Certified Senior Advisor specializes in
working with family and professional caregivers to navigate healthcare
and aging concerns. Wilson, an expert in the field of caregiving, has
personally helped thousands of family and professional caregivers since
2000 in her career as an advocate, a care navigator, and an educator.
Through her company, The Care Navigator, she is an advocate and service
provider in the roles of guardian, power of attorney, care manager, and
transition specialist. She was producer and host of The Caring
Generation®, from 2009 to 2011, an educational radio program for
caregivers on 630 KHOW-AM. In addition to her work at the Care
Navigator, Pamela gives back to the community by serving as chairperson
of the Community Ethics Committee in Denver, Colorado.